Stages of a Sales Process
When you own a business, increasing sales of your products or services is most likely one of your primary goals. To increase sales, you may want to get back to basics and teach your staff the proper sales process. The sales process has several stages that a sales representative must go through.
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Prospect and Interview
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The first part of the sales process involves prospecting for customers. If you work in inside sales, the customers might come to you. In that case, you will start by interviewing the customer. During both of these stages, you contact the customer for the first time and begin talking to him. This stage involves finding out what the customer wants and needs. By getting this information, you can determine what products to show.
Presentation
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After you decide what to show the customer, it is time to make a presentation. Depending on what you are selling, this presentation might be more involved or it could be subtle. During this stage, you simply show what your product or service can do for the customer. You try to differentiate your product from anything else in the market and convince your customer that he needs or wants this product. This is the time to use persuasion skills to make the customer want to buy.
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Closing the Sale
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Once you present the product or service to the customer, it is time to negotiate. Depending on your product, you may have a fixed price for your product. In many industries, you may have to negotiate a specific price for your product or service. Then you negotiate the terms of the deal, such as financing or add-ons to the sale. You may also have to overcome some objections along the way before you can close the sale. Once the objections have been dealt with, you can close the sale.
Follow Up
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Many sales personnel make the mistake of closing the sale and then moving on completely. While you always want to focus on prospecting and selling to new customers, you also need to follow-up with your existing sales. Make sure that your customers are happy with the products or services that they bought. When you create happy customers, you can also create a stream of referrals for yourself. This also helps lead to repeat business at some point in the future.
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